IBM ThinkPad X31 Review - Conclusions
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The ThinkPad X31, based on Intel's Pentium M processor, designed for the road warrior who is never near any form of electrical outlet, does its job well. Light and compact, it can handle today's office tasks with ease. However, its design comes with a few drawbacks -- it skips features that some would consider to be absolute necessities such as optical drives -- and fits a very tight niche market.
Its great battery life allows you to spend over half of a business day working without recharging, and it is well suited for PowerPoint presentations and the like with its easy to configure display options. The Mobile Radeon 7000 handles these things well. However, if the work that is going to be done on the laptop is more intensive, the 256 MB default memory configuration is simply not enough and will need to be upgraded. In general, I would suggest an upgrade to at least 512 MB of RAM.
Linux users may or may not enjoy the challenge of installing their distribution of choice. It would require purchasing a docking station and optical drive from IBM, or PXE booting the laptop. The Intel PRO/2100 Wireless adapter has some support for Linux, but do your homework before trying to install Linux on the X31. Windows users who frequently find themselves in trouble with spyware and viruses will like the fact that they do not have to find recovery CDs to reinstall Windows since an image is stored in a partition not readable by Windows on the hard drive.
In short, the X31 is great for those who are extremely mobile. If you need more than the absolute basics, consider a laptop that is more feature rich. I can't recommend this laptop for many students, but some business people may find it a perfect fit. Consider your computing habits before purchasing the X31.
Highs
- Great battery life
- Really light
- Wireless, ethernet, and modem make connectivity a breeze
Lows
- No optical drive
- Not the fastest performance
- Default 256 MB is just not enough.
Also, keep in mind that this configuration is one of many that you can get from IBM. If you think your processor needs more horsepower, there are other X31s available.
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